Bouguereau Quote 2

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Hey everyone, welcome back! Today we have a great quote from good ol’ William-Adolphe Bouguereau. As you probably know, he’s one of my favorite master painters. In this quote he talks about the changing times…something we can all relate to.

“One shouldn’t believe in all those so-called innovations. There is only one nature and only one way to see it. Nowadays, they want to succeed too fast, this is how they go about inventing new aesthetics, pointillism, pipisme! All this is just to make noise.” ~ William-Adolphe Bouguereau

Since he was so talented and studious, and painted in a classical manner based on realism, he was getting flack from the other boys like Seurat. They had a bit of a feud which is probably what provoked Bouguereau to say what he did above. Or perhaps he was saying it about the others who were not maintaining the great standard that Seurat was.

Bouguereau is right to say that there is only one nature, and only one way to see it, but some artists can still interpret it with their own unique vision and still uphold the profound techniques of the masters before them. If artists back in the day were just placing dots on the canvas to be different without using the design methods of visual communication, then they were indeed making more “noise” in the art world. More splattered paint, more paint by numbers works to hang at the local Walmart. I say feel free to paint in whatever fashion you wish. Just remember to use these masterful design techniques to communicate your visual message with clarity.

Do you like the change art has taken, or do you think it’s getting out of control and sloppy? Send me a message if you like. Until then, take care and happy designing! See you next time.

I’ll leave you with some pieces by Bouguereau and a LINK to view a gallery that is in chronological order.